"Empty Bowls Benefit" in the Morning, Hiking the Lake Erie Shore in the Afternoon with Friends of Chautauqua Watershed Conservancy

Empty Bowls Benefit in Dunkirk, NY

Hiking Lake Erie In Our  Groovy (?) Matching Day Glo Hats

Sunday Morning at 7:30

Up earlier than usual, at 6:00, glad to get up from dreaming on and off about the Steve Jobs biography I have been avidly reading.  It was one of those night where you keep trying to get something out of your mind, Jobs, but he keeps popping up again, like a whack a mole.  It's starting to get light out; I can see some clouds, dark and threatening like yesterday.  A cold, cold Sunday.  We love it.  At the moment, the lake is rimmed by a white shoreline, black shadows on the lake's edge, a smooth gray puddle in the middle.  I just walked outside to take a picture of the sunrise (none to speak of) and noticed there's a thin skin of ice along the shore.  Time to jump in the kayaks and become ice breakers.

Empty Bowls Imprint

Our Favorite Shape

Evie's Soup and Oatmeal Bowl

Empty Bowls in Chinese Characters

We had a full Saturday, perhaps more than we wanted but who wants to sit home all day in the house watching one football game after another.  We left at 9:45 for Dunkirk, to participate in the Empty Bowls program in Dunkirk.  Potters from the area make at least a thousand bowls, to sell for ten or twenty dollars, and 100% of the proceeds go to the Food Bank.  It's an amazing benefit, well organized, lots of volunteers, plus you can pick out any bowl you want.  We got there early but others were already inside, hoping to get that perfect bowl before they were picked over.  Everyone is really welcoming, with greeters at the door to explain the process.  We spent about a half hour browsing the pottery before picking out four bowls we liked.  We then took them to the kitchen window, where volunteers washed and dried them; we then moved on to the next window, with a choice of three soups.  We ate our soups, listening to a duo play mostly country songs.  When we were finished, our bowls were washed, dried, and packaged, to be taken home, again by volunteers, one a friend from yoga classes in Westfield.  The whole process had a great feel to it, people helping others in need, which we love, plus you get a bowl.  A great way to spend the morning.  

Volunteers Washing Bowls

We did not get home from Dunkirk until 1:00, after stopping at one of our favorite delis in the area, Tuscany in Fredonia, with all kinds of kitchen stuff which Evie loves to browse.  The Chautauqua Watershed Conservancy was sponsoring a walk along the Lake Erie shoreline in Barcelona at 3:15, so we decided to participate though we had not signed up for it and did not check their website late enough to see if it was on.  We got there at 3:15, to an empty parking lot, drove around to check other areas, returned, parked for five minutes.  Finally, two other cars drove up, neither had signed up for the walk either; neither had checked the website.  Obviously, the hike had been cancelled.  Nevertheless, the six of us decided to make the best of our drive so we walked the beach for an hour, up to the Chautauqua Gorge creek, then along it up to RT. 5 and then back to the beach, and home to our cars.  It was bitter cold heading west along the beach because of the wind, fine coming back.  After the walk, the six of us went to a winery on RT. 20, the 21 Brix Winery.  We stood at the bar tasting, bought a couple of bottles of white, and sat and talked for about an hour.  One of the couples, Bob and Bev Lannon, we had met at a previous Conservancy hike.  They live in Mayville, have been residents since 1988. The other couple, Terry and Kathy Horner, are lifetime Jamestown residents; he worked for many years at WCA hospital.  All are retired so we had much in common.  It was a fun way to end a nice walk along the Lake Erie shoreline.  I did check the Conservancy website this morning and, alas, the hike was cancelled yesterday because of inclement weather.  

Walking to the Mouth of Chautauqua Creek on Lake Erie

We left about 6:30, picked up a rotisserie chicken at the Lighthouse since neither one of us wanted to worry about dinner.  We were both hungry, so Evie made a salad, heated up some barbecued beans, and we ate, watching another Homeland, then Masters of Sex in between swatches of the Ohio State loss to Michigan State.  Actually, I couldn't wait to go upstairs to read my Jobs biography because I am at the point where the Mac is first being introduced, the computer that changed history, at least according to Jobs.